billski wrote:It would be interesting to get a statistics-wonk to crunch some numbers here. 1. What is the accident rate by day of week? Time of Day? Holiday/not?2. Accident rate by type of trail. 3. Accident rate by nr. of tickets sold.4. Accident rate by weather and snow surface conditions.5. Accident rate (hitter/hittee) by sex.6. Accident rate by days of skier experience.

I suspect these numbers are already known by resorts, but would be entirely reticent about releasing them. Understandable, but unfortunate. If we knew these things, we might chose our ski and lesson times differently. [I'm the fellow whose wife was in a private lesson and hit from an uphill unguided missle/skier, sending her to the hospital for a concussion.]

These would be some fantastic numbers to get your hands on. In fact I think I am going to try to spend some time hunting on the internet to see what I can find. The problem is the number of incidents that go unreported. I am as guilty of that as anyone. I am a PSIA certified ski instructor at a small mountain (BTW thanks for your vote of confidence in us small mountain instructors, I think you are dead on right) and I have been hit more this season that any i can remember. Perhaps I have had some bad luch but I am up to 7 collisions this year. 7! every time from behind, most without me even knowing that they were coming before I got hit. 2 times this year it has been so bad and so blatant that I tore up their passes. I know that people pay a lot of $$$ to come ski and as an employee I am supposed to make that experience as fun as possible but these were both people that literally could have killed someone. These incidents both happened in slow skiing areas. I am 6'1" and 205lbs so I can take a fair hit but what if they had smashed into someone's kid....
I don't really know what the solution is though.

Yes there is a huge problem with people getting into areas that they have no business skiing and the non-standardization of trail markings does cause some of this problem. there are 2 other sides of this that I see though. What about people going too fast where it is not safe to because of # of beginners? What about those machisimo idots who think that just because they can sort of get down something 3/4 out of control that they belong there and they go back to do it again. People sometimes seem to intentionally put themselves and others at risk.

I suspect the answers to Bill's questions are what we expect directionally. But it would be interesting to know how MUCH higher by number of tickets sold, late in the day, hard/icy snow, 18-29 males, etc.

The way to do this is by something like the annual Kottke Survey, where the data is grouped regionally or nationally, and thus specific areas would not be singled out.

The best way to evaluate trail ratings for an unknown area is to examine the length to vertical rise ratios of the lifts. 3-1 or less is likely advanced to expert, 5-1 or more is beginner to low intermediate. There is an unhelpful trend of fewer trail maps publishing this info.

Just below the top of Glacier Express chair at Blackcomb, our Extremely Canadian instructor showed us how to straightline a narrow slot between rocks with a long runout into the Horstman Glacier. The runout crossed a groomed run which he told us to check before dropping in. On the second go around I neglected to make the check and got chewed out (justifiably so) for crossing the groomer at high speed about 10 feet behind another skier.

Today Adam and I were standing on the groomed run in Burnt Stew Basin when I got flattened by an out-of-control skier. I hit the snow with my whole body so the only noticeable ache is a slightly bruised rib. In the collision a ski flew into the air and cut Adam's arm.

This was a totally wide open area and pretty dumb collision IMHO. But after yesterday I guess I have little grounds to complain.

Tony Crocker wrote:Today Adam and I were standing on the groomed run in Burnt Stew Basin when I got flattened by an out-of-control skier. I hit the snow with my whole body so the only noticeable ache is a slightly bruised rib. In the collision a ski flew into the air and cut Adam's arm.

I recall Burnt Stew as being so flat that you couldn't get up enough speed to cause much damage.

My opinion as a life-long skier at Killington, known for high skier density and the worst of the convergence of agressive New Yorkers and Bostonians:

* The problem is typically excessive testerosterone in the early-teen to 20-something crowd.

* It's not a skier versus snowboarder thing. Doesn't matter whether it's straight skis in the 1970's, snowboards in the 1990's, or twin tips in 2005.

* There are just as many skiers skiing into the blind side of snowboarders as there are snowboarders ignoring their blind side.

* I tend to get hit by skiers, not snowboarders. It almost always happens on groomed steeps where I'm run down from behind. The skier tends to be about 20 and aggressively tries to blame me for some imagined slight even though I clearly had the right of way.

* I never get hit in the bumps. Good mogul skiers let you know where they're going to be if they're skiing faster than you are.

* I think grooming is what causes the problem. On a groomed slope, it's really easy to exceed your skill level. I think trail congestion actually slows people down so you rarely have the high speed collisions where people get hurt.

* I tend to get hit by skiers, not snowboarders. It almost always happens on groomed steeps where I'm run down from behind.
[/quote]

Hmmm, "lucky you". Over the past 20 years two of three meaningful hits I experienced were with ski area snowmobiles on some urgent mission. Each vehicle came around a blind corner at high speed and hit me as I descended along a trail edge. Both times I was flipped over the driver and the driver was unseated during the collision. Both drivers had the gall to blame me. One wanted to mix it up. I suppressed the impulse to take his head off with my ski because I just felt lucky to not get my skis trapped under the runners. Trapped skis might have blown my knees.

Cheers,
Jeff

When encountering a skier, turn. Same goes for a tree.
-2nd Law of Skiing

I'm a boarder and I haven't hit someone...when I almost did, I just let myself fall on my butt. That's what gets me...I think it's pretty easy to stop to avoid hitting someone, even if it's a fall. haha

Have been hit by a few other boarders before - young kids. Never been hit by skiers. I think it's the age, not the choice of equip.

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